The World Baseball Classic is a culmination of all of the best baseball countries in the world, where they face off against one another in a World Cup style-tournament to decide which country is truly the king of baseball. Recently the qualifiers have wrapped up, giving four countries the remaining spots in the future tournament: Nicaragua, Chinese Taipei, Colombia, and Brazil. Most are familiar faces from the 2023 tournament, Nicaragua, Chinese Taipei, and Colombia. However, this year,Brazil made its third appearance in the world baseball classic. These teams looked scary in the qualifiers, and pose a threat to almost every automatic bid country. However, because Brazil qualified this year, they have displaced China, a country that has had its share of rocky baseball play recently.
After appearing in the World Baseball Classic in 2023, they got clobbered in the Tucson division, first losing 2-12 to Germany, then 1-8 to Colombia, and finally 2-12 against Brazil by allowing 32 runs in the span of 3 games. China’s defensive production throughout the qualifiers was extremely worrying for fans as they got mercy-ruled in two of their games (Losing by 10 so the games concluded early) and expended several pitchers each night in effort. In their game against Brazil, they ran through five pitchers, each of which allowed 3 runs, all in a grand total of 7 innings. The 2026 World Baseball Classic will be the first tournament in which the team does not participate. While China’s absence may seem like a surprise to some more casual fans, real watchers saw this one coming. Junior Randy Chen says he is “not surprised” because “they were terrible in the last baseball classic”. In the 2023 World Baseball Classic, China went 0-4, not even coming close to a win, and exiting the tournament on a 22-2 loss to Korea, a game that ended in the 5th inning!
Why does this country, with a population of 1.4 billion, surrounded by baseball powerhouse countries (Japan, Korea, Taiwan), and with a history of strong international sports, fall short when it comes to baseball? The first of which is the strange baseball history in China. Baseball entered China extremely early, in 1864 under the Qing dynasty. However, Mao Zedong eradicated baseball in the 1960s due to its relationship with democracy. While it did make a return, the pause left a major impact on the culture behind the sport. China missed a generation of baseball players and its effects can be seen today. There is a lack of knowledgeable coaches and trainers in China because almost nobody living there now that is of age grew up playing baseball. Varsity baseball player Gavin Fabella claims that coaches are essential because “Baseball is a very technical sport, the mechanics behind a perfect swing are almost impossible to learn”, so coaches play a major role in teaching these players technique.
China also has a reputation for poor team sports, for example, baseball, basketball, hockey, and soccer. This trend is due to many reasons, however, one being their sports system. China runs state-sponsored programs where they send promising young children to relentlessly practice sports. Which in practice works, but only for individual sports. Hence why China is strong in ping pong, weightlifting, swimming, and many more. This model does not work out for team sports though because there is a lack of focus on overall team culture and chemistry in the state facilities. repetition-based training does not triumph game experience in team sports. So China’s baseball team remains a few steps behind the competition due to Mao Zedong’s eradication of baseball in the 1960s and the state controlled method of sports training.
